Webber has harsh words for former coach O'Brien

Published 4:00 am, Saturday, March 1, 2008

Webber fired back at his first ex-Sixers coach Friday, saying that O'Brien lied in telling reporters last month that Webber dogged practices and refused to play in the low post after being traded to Philadelphia during the 2004-05 season.

"I don't know why he said that," Webber said. "He must have been trying to justify why he was fired or why players didn't like him."

O'Brien, now the Pacers coach, was let go by Philly at the end of the season. Webber, who was coming off microfracture surgery, averaged 15.6 points, 7.9 rebounds and 39 percent shooting under O'Brien.

The forward bounced back with Cheeks taking over the following year, averaging roughly 20 points and 10 rebounds a game before falling out of the rotation and accepting a buyout in January 2007.

Crazy eights: Don't expect Cheeks to make any apologies if his Sixers, who entered Friday's game as the eighth-best team in the East with a 26-32 mark, end up making the playoffs while teams with superior records in the West get left out.

"It's not our fault," Cheeks said. "Our take is that eight teams get in regardless of their record. That's how it's been since I came into the league and that's how it should be. It's unfortunate that East Coast teams' records are not what the West Coast teams' records are, but that's the system."

Though the chasm between the conferences has sparked talk of reformatting the playoffs to include only the teams with the 16 best records in the NBA, Commissioner David Sterndismissed the idea at his annual state of the league address during All-Star weekend.